The Breeze is Brisk
by literaturewank
Summary: I was watching the Little Mermaid shortly after marathoning through a A:tLA rewatch, and this fic was born. It does not take place in a canon environment, but Zuko is still a Banished Prince, while Katara is a Mermaid.
1. Chapter 1

The breeze is brisk, the sky is blue, and the ocean is wet. It has been such, for days. On end. The only particular difference is that the crew is out of tobacco and the ship far from port. For a cloudless day, a storm is certainly brewing within the heart of the Banished Prince. He has thus far managed to escape his Uncle's persistence in drowning him in tea rather than the salty water below, but he doubts that he will escape for long; it is merely another facet of the endless tedium.

One would imagine pirate hunting would be livelier, and yet, Prince Zuko leans over the starboard steel railing of the main deck, wondering how many more months his Lord Father will have him endure this punishment. Feeling listless, Zuko cannot even pretend that he is actually sailing with any purpose, that his so-called mission is anything more than a waste of his crew's and his own time. He cannot even bring himself to use the Court's fat purse to fund field excursions; as he is being punished, the Prince will endure it with dignity and will not spend his "little trip," as his sister so sarcastically sugarcoated it, depleting the Crown's coffers, knowing full well that the People would pay for any feasting and festivities he might have enjoyed, cruising from port to port like a wayward royal rather than an exile. No, Prince Zuko has more honour than that, even if his Uncle is keen on brewing their expenses away.

The Prince chides himself – he is being unfair – his Uncle volunteered to accompany him, and skies above, Zuko knows that had it not been for his Uncle's perceptiveness, the Banished Prince might have hurled himself overboard, in a fit of pique, on several occasions. Instead, with a gentle tug on his elbow and a cushion suddenly under his bottom, Zuko found himself in the tea room off of the galley: his Uncle's abode. Soon a mug of tea would be warming his hand, and he no longer felt the urge to end it so dramatically, but to sit in peace and listen to his Uncle describe the lands from which the tea leaves had been harvested.

While Prince Zuko's and his Uncle Iroh's meetings over tea did not lessen, Zuko's quiet contemplations over how the waves would feel if hit from such an angle in the night became far less frequent in their intrusions. His Uncle knows this. They have discussed it. Yet Zuko can feel Uncle Iroh's gaze hitting him square in the back, a steady reminder that he is not unwatched so close to the water. Zuko waves his hand nonchalantly, letting his watcher know, he is fine, he is just gazing. It is not even pretty anymore, the ocean. Where it was once wondrous in its constant shift between push and pull, it now seems forever dull in its unchanging change.

Zuko is almost ready to turn around and make his rounds on the ship - ready to casually suggest to a crewmate, in front of his Uncle, that they test how tea leaves fair in a tobacco pipe – when something floating catches his eye. He grips the railing and leans further forward but the morning sun is in his good eye and he can hardly make out what is likely just a log or some flotsam. Whatever it is, it is at least a moment's curiosity to quell the boredom. And quell it does. Like a shock to the system, Zuko is jolted to astonishment when he shadows his eyes with a hand to his forehead, and sees something...person-shaped, floating in the middle of the ocean. He calls forward a few nearby crew members, and while he does so, his eyes adjust and he is assuredly looking at someone floating on their back, hair fanned out around her.

He jumps.

Not for the reason his Uncle has worried he might, for months now, but he jumps. No one else is jumping, everyone else is stilled, but he jumped, and now he is clumsily splashing against the waves, not looking back to see the crew waving for the Captain's attention so that they may anchor the ship and send out the rafts to go fetch the Prince before the mermaid drowns him. The activity on the ship is not the only thing Prince Zuko fails to see, and it is what everyone who failed to jump managed to see; the fishtail attached quite firmly to the young woman's midriff. Stark as daylight. His Uncle will later claim that his nephew had merely been distracted by a set of bare breasts, Agni knows Zuko has not seen a pair in a long while.

Sputtering salt water out of his mouth and nose, Zuko startles the woman out of her reverie, sliding an arm firmly around her waist and under her forearm when he feels his fingers brush against _it_. His gaze drops just as she slaps him soundly across the face.

"It's rude to grab at people when they are napping!" she scolds him, finger-shake and all as she pushes him an arm's length away with her other hand.

He doesn't even have the decency to look her in the eye as she reprimands him, no, he is too busy staring at her distal fin, and it is making Katara uncomfortable. Before she can tell him off for that, he jerks his head up, staring at her face.

"Nap?"

"Should I bother talking if you're just going to repeat everything I say?" she asks, rolling her eyes, and then catching sight of the ship's crew carefully lowering a raft full of men into the ocean.

Katara waves enthusiastically at the crew, shouting, "I'll bring him back!"

The crewmembers seem to rush their movements even more at this, and Katara is not keen at having them taking her inept, would-be rescuer away; she has not had a chance to properly talk to him, they have not even been introduced!

"That's okay, right? You're not ready to go back anyway, are you?" His eyes are still wide with shock, but Zuko is not saying anything, so Katara decides to take that as an assent, and hauls him into her arms, just as he was attempting to do with her earlier. Katara swims fast, faster than she does when she races her brother against the riptide, and almost as fast as when she is gliding under a ship with a sail full of wind. She ducks the two of them underwater, not long enough for the man to drown, but long enough for his crew to lose sight of them, to not know in which direction she is heading. Zuko wriggles feebly in her arms, protesting the travel, but Katara hopes he considers this a lesson in grabbing young women mid-nap; don't grab if you're so against it yourself. It goes like this for a little while, neither is sure for how long, but she swims with him in one hand, and pushes the water with the other; over and under the water's breaking surface, under and over, over and under, until she is certain they have not and cannot be followed.

They break to the surface again, but this time Katara stops, lets Zuko go momentarily, and grabs his wrist instead. He takes a few heaving breaths and kicks until he feels comfortable with the paddling he has going on; he is not in danger of sinking, and with her, he is certain he is not in danger of drowning, not unless the mermaid wants him to. Zuko sweeps the messily cropped hair from his eyes and looks at Katara full on. He is too bewildered to even take anything in, apart from the cool blue of her eyes, and the full lips below them.

Katara giggles and it shatters Zuko's shock like glass, pricking him back into reality.

"You-...You can't do this!" Zuko shouts haltingly, the saltwater making his throat feel like he must scrape each word out. "I-...What are you? You need to take me back! I'm a prince and that is an order, you can't just _take_ people, my crew..."

"I will bring you back," she smiles. "And no one said I _couldn't_ take you, I even asked."

The Banished Prince growls at Katara; he is at a loss for words, and attempts to swim away, in any direction, it does not matter which.

"Nonononono, don't leave," the mermaid splashes after him, tightening her grasp on his wrist. "I said I would take you back, I wasn't lying. Please. I was bored. There weren't any clouds to watch, so I took a nap instead, and then you came along. But you'll talk to me, won't you?" she asks in earnest, eyes pleading. "I won't make you stay swimming here; I know a place where you can put your legs. You know, ground. On a beach."

He nods his head, "Please." The prideful Prince will not admit it, but he _is_ getting quite tired. Katara beams at him and heads towards the cliffside behind Zuko, pulling him along. The waves rock more turbulently here, but Katara does not acknowledge that _he_ is the one clutching _her_ wrist now. Where they are headed becomes apparent to Zuko as he and Katara approach the rocks ahead; a cave within the lower portion of the cliffside, and Zuko steels himself for an ugly, dank lair littered with fish bones and strands of seaweed. He scowls, but does not remark on it.

The cave is as dark and dreadful as Zuko had imagined, but the length of it exceeds his earlier conclusion, and he begins to worry over how far back the cave extends, and just how far the mermaid plans on taking him. He wonders if he should start resigning himself to his approaching death when Zuko realises that the back of the cave is not as dark as it ought to be, but that there seems to be a faint glow of sunlight.

Not a cave at all, but a secret tunnel!

The other side of the rocky expanse of cliff is only half submerged into the sea; the other half is flush against a beautiful and secluded cove on an isle Zuko could probably run the length of in half an hour, and the width in even less. The sand is pale and littered with shells, and the beachy flora is green and lush.

"It's lovely," the Prince breathes, for it is like nothing he has ever seen; the splendour of his own palace is incomparable to the sheer natural peace of the isle. The mermaid smiles smugly at him, and wraps him over her back so he will not tire the rest of the swim to the beach. Katara drags him all the way to the shore, insistent that she can lie where the tide pulls in just as well as he can.


	2. Chapter 2

Lying on their backs, the Prince and the mermaid thread their fingers through the warming sand, and stay quiet a moment, suddenly shy in the open air, blanketed by the lapping waves. Katara lifts herself up, bracing her weight on her arms, not bothering to pull her thick, curling hair from her face. Rather, in a futile attempt at discretion, she side-eyes the young man beside her, through the curtain of her hair. He is still lying spread eagle in the sand, laboriously attempting to catch his breath under the blue of the sky. Katara brushes her hair behind her ear before pulling it back out; it is grainy from the sand. Instead, she peeks timidly at the man she sort of abducted. Frustrated by her sudden, uncharacteristic shyness, the mermaid gathers herself and turns to face the so-called Prince, taking his strangeness in stride, just as he rolls onto his side, and sits up to do the same.

Katara does not recognise it for what it is, but she can tell that he is clad in much finer material than she has ever seen before, his military uniform is nothing like fisherman garb. His face is foreign and his hair is cropped rather messily. As he is no longer breathing so harshly, Katara decides that now is as good a time as any to begin their conversation – the day _is_ wasting.

"I didn't drown you, now did I?" Katara points out. "I'm not rude enough to do that without knowing your name."

Zuko snorts at her roundabout way of asking, "Prince Zuko," he answers the unasked question. "Although I don't think I'm prince of anything here." The sky is endless and blue above him, and a feeling of serenity washes over him with the waves. This would be what freedom feels like. There is nothing here, and to the Banished Prince, that means everything. The girl to his right is unaware of his transgressions, and therefore, unjudgemental. She doesn't know him from Agni; such a beautifully clean slate. Zuko finds it palatably refreshing.

"Mine's Katara," she responds firmly, as though it is very important that Zuko know it. "What sort of name is _Zuko_?"Katara croons his name as she attempts to figure it out, tonguing it between her teeth.

"Do you do this often? Steal away sailors, I mean?"

"No."

Katara replies too fast for it to be anything but a lie.

Zuko smirks. "I take it that means you aren't supposed to either."

Katara is blushing now, an interesting, dusky colour on her umber skin.

"Well," Zuko continues gruffly, "As long as you don't drown or eat me, like you people do in the stories."

With an affronted look on her face, Katara gasps, "I would never! I can't believe anyone would do such a thing, I can't believe there are people saying it! How awful! _Our_ stories are much nicer, less bloody. I think my dad is right, you're a violent people, if not savages."

Zuko scoffs. "Savages, huh? That's funny, considering. What are your stories then?"

"No, you first. I brought you here, an act of kindness. You must return the favour; I want a story. A good one. It can't have a horrible ending or any irreparable sadness." Katara looks eager, sitting up and bracing herself on her full arm. Zuko stands up.

"I don't know any fairytales."

He walks along the crest of the beach, suddenly sullen. Katara frowns after him. "That's impolite, I can't follow you that way!" She swims back out to the sea, and for a moment the Prince is worried that she will leave him on the small isle in nowhere, but her head pops up a few feet from him, floating serenely in a small inlet.

"Take those off." Katara taps his boots impatiently.

"What, my boots?"

"Mm, yes, please. Boots. Off."

With a sigh Zuko sits in the sand and pulls off his boots to appease her. She handles them with care for a few moments before haphazardly tossing them aside and reaching for a foot. Startled, Zuko scrambles backwards, but Katara has a firm hold on his ankle, and the look she gives him clearly states that she is not ready to let go. She yanks his foot forward, and Zuko is pulled to sitting on the ledge of the inlet the mermaid is currently occupying. Cool hands grip his foot before one slick hand slides the hem of his trousers up and over his knee.

Katara starts to laugh and Zuko pulls his leg back, furious.

"What?! Don't laugh at me like that!" He is about to stand up and walk to the middle of the isle where she cannot bother him, but she pulls him back down, and controls her giggles into mostly contained breaths.

"Sorry! I just, I didn't know legs were _hairy_! It looks silly...and seems rather useless, don't you think?"

"I-...what? I don't know." He looks at her as though she is the queerest thing, which, each to the other, they are. While Zuko is distracted, Katara pulls off his sock and throws that aside as well.


	3. Chapter 3

**Unbeta'd, unedited, etc.**

Katara palms the underside of Zuko's foot, and he shudders, but does not pull back as he did before.

"Oh, I'm sorry, did that hurt?" the mermaid looks up at him with concern pooling in her unfathomably deep blue eyes, biting her lower lip.

Her touch is tentative as Zuko shakes his head. "No, just, ah, ticklish."

Katara shrugs and moves on, tweaking each of his toes.

"What does this one do?" Katara asks, pinching his big toe.

"Nothing."

"Why not?"

"Look, I don't know! They're toes, they're just there." The Prince is blushing under the mermaid's scrutiny, clenching his fists and not looking her in the eyes, needlessly embarrassed.

"Had I known I was taking such a grumpy man, I would've left you there!" Katara hisses, crossing her arms over her breasts and hrmph-ing indignantly.

And therein, apart from the secret shyness she was slowly dragging out of him with her explorations, lie the source of Prince Zuko's misdirected ire. The fishgirl, _Katara_, is obviously used to her state of undress, and if it is the norm for her people, as Zuko supposes that is must be, her bared breasts are absolutely innocent in nature. The Banished Prince, however, is not, and this barbaric, albeit lovely, sea creature is making him feel dishonourable every time his eyes inadvertently drag across her chest. There is nothing particularly unwholesome about her lower half; it is just a fishtail after all, but from her navel up, it is all a smooth expanse of brown skin and all too human curves.

It should be indecent – his cultural standards are strict on the rules of propriety, but on Katara, the exposure is natural. Nevertheless, as innocent as her culture may be, Zuko is hardly innocent, and he finds her nudity uncomfortably arousing. The Prince feels shameful to be inflamed by such an ingenuous display of flesh, and he hates himself for having to forcibly avert his thoughts from her breasts.

So, Zuko leans forward and brushes the mermaid's hair over her shoulders, effectively covering her breasts. If Katara can be so immediate in her uncommonly intimate touches, then Zuko can at least touch her hair a moment (and such soft hair it is!) without it being untoward.

Katara is unaware of the Prince's rationale behind his adjustment of her hair, and she bats his hand away as he moves to drop it back into his lap. It seems that she prefers to give rather than take, and considers the whole of their situation to be of her doing, and therefore must match her accord.

"_Well_?" Katara asks, hands on her hips as she glares at the Banished Prince.

"Er, pardon?" Zuko blinks in confusion.

"Are you going to be interesting or not? I thought you would be fascinating, but if you're just going to sit there, blinking at me..."

"I'm sorry; I'm not well-schooled in the art of conversation."

"I thought you said you are a prince?"

"The two are not mutually inclusive. I was not a very good prince, otherwise I wouldn't be on that Spirits' forsaken ship."

"What did you _do_?" Katara asks. Suddenly intrigued, she leans forward, eyes wide. With her this close, Zuko notices that the blue of her eyes is only exaggerated by her inhumanly wide pupils, which are not exactly circular, as his are.

"It hardly matters," the Banished Prince snaps.

"Well, I say it does," Katara replies heatedly. "I won't spend my day with a murderer or an attempted despot."

"Attempted despot? No, that would be my sister, given the chance. I...made a bad call on some military arrangements. A juvenile mistake that I wouldn't accept as such. It's treason to argue or disobey my Lord Father. I was stupid, therefore, I was banished. I deserved it." Prince Zuko adds at Katara's gasp. "I have to redeem myself to my Father before he cedes the throne to my sister instead. If...if I'm still considered exiled after I turn five and twenty, my sister inherits the throne. Azula...Azula is war hungry."

The pause of silence seems to stretch for ages before Katara places a wet hand over Zuko's, fits it within her palm, and squeezes reassuringly.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean...to bring all that up. I was too forward. I am sorry for that, and for your situation as well." Katara's eyes are mournful and sincere.

Zuko rubs the back of his neck and shrugs, "Well, now you can consider me interesting."

The silence becomes heavier than before, and awkward as well, until Zuko's stomach rumbles and startles Katara out of contemplation, with a laugh. Zuko would never tell her, but the mermaid's laugh isn't too far from sounding like the throaty caw of a seagull; unflattering but nice anyway.

"You're hungry! I'm certain you have nothing on you, and what's on this beach is rather sparse. Let me get you something, my treat!" Katara dives into the water and disappears before the Prince can say a word. The sun is edging closer to its noontime peak, and Katara is not back yet. With a stretch, Prince Zuko decides to explore the little isle, thinking one of the clumps of trees sports lychee nuts amidst the branches. He sets to collecting them when a brown head, followed by a lithe body, pulls up onto the shore.

"You took your time," Zuko calls out. When he reaches the sandy inlet Katara has come to rest at, he drops the lychee nuts into a shallow indention in the sand, making a small pile.

"I resent that! I wasn't sure what you would like." It is only then that the Banished (_and mildly spoilt_, Katara thinks, _despite his exile_) Prince notices that the mermaid's arms are full. She pushes what she has foraged into his lap.

It is an assortment of sea prunes, ocean kumquat, sea slug, and gull mackerel. One of the gull mackerel flops half-heartedly, causing Katara to reach for it and whack it against a nearby rock. She expertly slits the fish open with a jagged sea shell, tears a portion of the flesh from the inside, and offers it to Zuko.

"Thank you," he says politely, placing one fist in the upright palm of his other hand, and bowing slightly. "But I can't eat it raw."

"Raw?" Katara looks at him quizzically.

"I need to cook it first," he explains.

"Can I watch?" the mermaid asks eagerly.

"Uh, sure. Would you like to help?"

Katara nods her head enthusiastically.

"Er, peel the lychee nuts like so," he says, taking a shell shard and showing her, taking a bite of the flesh within the fruit, and offering her the other half, to do the same. Katara's eyes light up in surprise at the taste, and she smiles warmly as Zuko walks towards the low growing trees, and begins to pull off dead branches.

"It's so spiky, I never would think to eat it," Katara exclaims when he returns, a small handful of the lychee nuts peeled, and several already eaten. Zuko digs a small pit in which he places the branches. Crouching over his makeshift firepit, the Prince sets about attempting to start a spark and keep it lit long enough to catch in the dry bramble. The mermaid looks on in awe, and when Zuko has finally managed to burn a steady flame, he falls back on his haunches. Katara's eyes are wide with wonder, her eyebrows nearly reaching her hairline.

"I've never seen a fire up close before, it's so...pretty," she breathes.

"Not really," Zuko grunts, looking at the flame with disdain. The Banished Prince sets about looking for a large, whole halfshell. Eyes lighting upon one, he peels strips of meat from the fish, and places them into his makeshift shell grill, adding the sea prunes and ocean kumquats and chunks of sea slug, topping it off with lychee juice. _It'll do_, he supposes.

As unprincely as it is, Zuko eats his meal with his hands, sucking the juices from his fingers. He really is hungrier than he had realised. Katara tastes some, makes an unladylike face, and spits her portion back into the ocean. "I like it better 'raw,'" she insists. Zuko shrugs and continues eating with gusto.

The mermaid lies lazily on the sand, her fishtail swishes lightly in the water, and her head rests in the crook of her elbow. She is staring dreamily into the flames.

"Do you have to cook everything to eat it?" she asks, breaking the silence.

"What? No, you saw me eat the lychee nut plain."

"Oh. So I did."

Katara begins feeling discontent with merely staring at the fire, and she reaches forward to touch it, with a look of intense curiosity in her eyes, but the Banished Prince smacks her hand away and pins her with a frightened yet furious grimace.

"Don't!"

"Why not?" Katara asks rebelliously, inching her hand forward once more. Zuko snaps at her, "No," and grips her wrists in one of his large hands.

"_Why not_?" Katara asks again, petulantly, just barely keeping a pout at bay.

"It's hot, you'll get burned," he replies dully before rearranging her hands safely into her...lap.

"What? So?"

"Burning does this!" Zuko angrily points to the left side of his face, more specifically to the raw and puckered skin that stretches back towards his mangled ear, and obscures part of his eye.

"Oh."

"What did you _think_ it was?"

"I don't know! Nysa has a whole purple splotch on her arm, and an extra finger, and she was just born like that. You don't even notice it because she's too busy prattling and preening over the necklace Miko gave her, as though it's anything special; he has given necklaces to at least two other girls he's been just stringin' along."

"Well, I wasn't born with mine, okay?!"

"How do you make them?"

Zuko is startled out of his anger. "Pardon?"

"Necklaces. Ours are cloth and beaded stone, but yours, the ones that fall into the ocean sometimes, are made of this," Katara taps a metal button on Zuko's trousers, attempting to steer the conversation away from his face, as it clearly upsets him. She took them to this private paradise for everything but unhappiness, to enjoy themselves. Katara does not wish to have Prince Zuko dwelling on anything that makes him so miserable, it defeats the purpose of their visit, and it is painful to see him thus.

"Huh?" the Prince is lost amid their conversation from Katara's whiplash topic change, so the mermaid tries again to explain.

"Metal necklaces. That's what they are, right? Metal? A sailor told me there are different kinds, and that _gold_ necklaces are for women like me. But he didn't have any gold to show me. Said he was poor. It was altogether a confusing conversation, about limited resources and starvation, because that is apparently a _thing_ up here, something that actually happens to you people. What a dreadful place, no community, no justice."

"For someone who knows so little of my world, you do talk an awful lot. There _are_ good things. Things worth fighting for. I only dream of going back, I'm sick of the sea!" Zuko skips a stone across one of the shallow low-tide pools, and Katara gives him a reprimanding look for disparaging her home, a look the prince decidedly ignores.

_If she loves her sea so much, she's welcome to it_, Prince Zuko thinks heatedly, _I love my land just as much, yet the unwelcome of it pains me to my core_.

"When you're...unexiled," Katara's voice breaks him out of his dejection, "you'll put everything right." She sounds so sure. "If you visit me often, I'll help you. The world needs peace, not strife, above and below the water's surface. It won't be easy. What if our worlds could work together, create peace in tandem," the mermaid chatters hopefully, her eyes dreamy.

Zuko snorts, "No, it won't be easy."

The day continues pleasantly, and Zuko finds himself enjoying a summer's day more than he ever has since his childhood, since his mother's death. It's freeing, to laugh and splash with the mermaid, with _Katara_, so much so that he forgets his embarrassment over juvenile behaviour, forgets his all-consuming duties. He hardly notes that sunset is nearing, not until a visitor surprises them both.

A head slowly emerges from the water, male, as far as Zuko can tell from the eyes peering over the surface, eyebrows framing what can only be a frown. Katara turns to see what Zuko has suddenly stopped to stare at, mid-story about a spidercat that had nested on a ledge outside his sister's room.

"Sokka!" she cries, and the merman swims forward carefully, slowly raising his head above water and not taking his eyes off of Prince Zuko.

"Kataraaa," the newcomer whines. "Who is he, and why is he here?"

"Oh, hahah, hi, Sokka, about that. It's a funny story, really." Katara laughs a little too loudly, as though she has been caught doing something she should not have. "Although, I should ask, why are you spying on me, Sokka?" she grits her teeth as she says this.

Sokka cocks and eyebrow. "Tell me, and I won't tell Gran Gran, I swear to Tui. Don't tell me and I'm sooooo telling everyone where this place is."

Zuko stays quiet where he sits, considering that it makes sense for there to be men, even if the stories never talk of them, and even if he really never imagined it before.

"Zuko, this is my brother, Sokka...Sokka, this is mynewfriendprincezuko," Katara rushes through the last part, uselessly hoping that her brother had missed the 'prince' bit.

"What?!" Sokka explodes, flapping his arms and splashing his sister. "Prince?! You took a fucking prince? _Katara_, take him back, take him right back, right now...young lady!"

"Oh, that is just fresh, Sokka, coming from you. Let's not forget your nighttime visits to Kyoshi Island."

"This is _sooooo_ different, Katara! You can't keep abducting humans for their life stories. First a pirate, now a _prince_?! You're...you're meddlesome, Katara. If dad finds out, ohohoh, if dad finds out, I'm not gonna help, nope, not even if your pirates and princes bring me all the land-meat in the world!" Sokka stops for a breath when he notices the firepit and inches closer.

"None of this is any of your business, Sokka. Go away. I promised I'll return him before nightfall." Katara continues to scold her brother, but he is not listening anymore; Sokka is far too busy eyeing the leftovers in the firepit.

"You have a problem, Katara. Just admit it. You're addicted to abducting. I hate to say it." Sokka's eyes flick to Zuko. "Er, hey, buddy...what's that?" Sokka points to the fish.

Zuko looks up, surprised. "Er, gull mackerel and-" Sokka cuts him off with a noise of disgust.

"Fish!" Sokka laments, "I am so tired of _fish_." He pushes himself back out to the breaking waves. "Katara, make sure the...prince is back by nightfall. Prince, pirate, the least you could do is catch someone who can spare me some land-meat. I'm serious, Katara. Take him back by nightfall."

"Yes, I _said_ I would take him back by nightfall, you don't have to tell me twice."

Sokka frowns at each of them in turn before diving off in a huff.

"Hahahaha, my brother. Your sister's war hungry, my brother is just...hungry." Katara's joke falls flat in the suddenly strained evening air.

Zuko is tense and rapt with attention. "Pirate?" he asks, with something strange in his tone, something he tries to pass off casually. However, he cannot hide his determined interest well, and Katara inexplicably begins to feel uneasy and defensive. "Just a friend," she tries to wave off the line of inquiry as indifferently as possible.

"Katara," the Banished Prince scoots closer and Katara shivers uncomfortably. "I would very much like you to tell me everything about your...friend."

**AN: I'm sorry. I still feel like I'm not writing this right, like I'm writing it poorly. I'm not doing justice to the story in my head. And I don't think I'm very good at keeping anyone in character, especially not Katara. I'm sorry. Oh, and how do I reply to reviews? I've tried, but it only seems to let me send them as PMs? What if I publicly want to respond to a review? Sorry, I am very new to this site.**


	4. Chapter 4

**Unedited, unbeta'd, etc.**

"There's nothing to tell, not really." Katara titters nervously, unsure of the sudden change in their conversational climate. Her hands brush through her hair of their own accord. "Really, it's not even your business. And perhaps this is none of mine, but...why do you ask?"

"You do know what a pirate is, don't you?" Zuko sneers condescendingly, disdain nearly dripping from the slight upturn of his mouth.

"Don't belittle me, I am not a child! My friend engages in...high-risk trading. It's a perfectly respectable pursuit. He...relocates objects of value to, er, stimulate the economy!" Katara is grasping at flimsy excuses for her friend's behaviour, and she knows it.

"It's _stealing_, Katara, and you know it. Don't try to pretend otherwise, you might hurt yourself." Zuko crosses his arms and fires the mermaid with a cutting stare.

Katara is torn. "He swore he is helping people," she falters, unusually uncertain of her convictions.

"Let me make this fair and offer you information first," Zuko uncrosses his arms and begins laying out crux of his situation. "There is a particular, elusive pirate that has been called the scourge of my Father's Nation. Should I bring him to justice, I know my Father would allow me to regain my birthright. Don't you see, Katara? This is my way back!" the Prince leans forward in desperation. "It might not even be the same man. Tell me the name of his ship, just tell me the name of the ship, and the _direction_ of the port of harbour he went to. You don't even have to name the port, just the direction."

Katara tugs her arm away, and Zuko looks at his offending hand as if he had not realised he was gripping the fishgirl's..._Katara's_ arm, let alone how tightly.

"I'll tell you the boat, and you tell me if it's the same man," Katara cedes, cagily.

The Banished Prince nods, slow and calculating.

"Sky Nomad," Katara says, eyes searching Zuko's expression for any sign of recognition. For some reason, she is precipitously hopeful that it is the wrong ship, that her Banished Prince is looking for someone else. The last shred of easiness fades from their comradery when Zuko's eyes alight with the fire of determination. Katara does not like this Prince, not at all; she wants the Prince who shed his nobility to swim away an afternoon with her, she wants _that_ prince back, not this other, militant creature. The mermaid is hesitant to tell Zuko anything more, wary of what this newly fervored man might do.

"And the direction?" the Banished Prince asks eagerly, but his sudden joy fades when he sees the thoughts behind those too blue eyes. "Katara," he growls. "_Tell me the direction_."

"Don't be forceful!" Katara backs away. "I don't have to do anything, and acting like this won't encourage any help from me! I don't actually owe you anything, and I could leave you here, if I wanted to. North, he went North. I feel awful telling you, but I'm only telling you because I doubt he stays in any one place long, but I'll tell you this too; you should stop. This...mission isn't healthy, and there's a good chance it's not even right. Consider something else, to please your father. You're hunting a man for all the wrong reasons. Justice isn't the forefront, is it? It should be, undeniably. So, you should stop. If you aren't doing this to bring justice, you should just stop."

"You're wrong," Zuko replies simply, with conviction.

"I think we should go now," Katara sighs, beckoning the Prince into the shallows and taking him in hand. "When you come to your senses, you may visit me again – you know where to find me. Otherwise, this is goodbye."

Zuko refrains from responding, and the rest of the swim is made in silence.

Just as Katara promised, they reach the Prince's naval ship as the sun begins to set, but the sight of the sun dipping below the waves is obscured by the second ship anchored and boarded to the first.

"Fuck," Prince Zuko breaks their silence, cursing repeatedly and emphatically.

Squinting at the ships, Katara asks, "What? It doesn't look like you're being attacked? Are you?"

The Banished Prince shakes his head and pushes Katara away as a raft descends from the bulwark of his ship, with some crew to fetch him. "You should go. If that is whose ship I think it is...you should really go." Zuko nudges Katara away again and swims towards the rescue raft, looking back to make sure the mermaid is heading back to...wherever she had come from. As he is being pulled up into his own ship, the vantage allows Zuko to see what he could not before; netting ropes. Startled, he leans over the side of the raft, waving and shouting and _pointing_ it out to Katara, frantic in his movements to direct her attention, urging her away with a silent prayer as well. The netting ropes go taut and being to rise along the side of the sister ship, more quickly than the raft is pulling Zuko up to his own ship, and he can see it is too late. Katara lashes out, but her violent maneuvers only manage to tangle up the mermaid more thoroughly. The powerful muscles in her fishtail writhe and spasm, whipping against the netting, and when this fails, Katara pulls and claws at the twine, but there is no give, no potential to tear. Still, she continues to fight, slowly wearing herself out the closer she gets to the main deck. She will be easy for Admiral Zhao's men to subdue by the time they yank her out of the net.

When Zuko reaches the upper deck of his own ship, he pulls himself out of the raft and clambers over the railing with intent, shoving off any offered helping hands. Searching out his Uncle, the Banished Prince storms through the amassing crew, until he finds the meddling old fool, and grabs Iroh by the shoulder, all too forcefully.

"You sent out a _distress signal_?! You let _Zhao_ board our ship? Uncle!" Prince Zuko grinds his teeth and does not allow his Uncle enough time to gather his wits and reply; the Banished Prince strides purposefully away, barking orders as he heads towards the gangplank and pushes past the guards Zhao had placed on the other end.

Admiral Zhao meets Prince Zuko halfway across the starboard side of the upper deck. Zuko eyes the puddles of saltwater briefly, and tucks away the mermaid's shrieks of fury, seemingly coming from somewhere below deck on the portside, into another corner of his mind. Admiral Zhao requires all of the Banished Prince's focus if Zuko wants to avoid being made to look the fool and to keep his temper in check. The Prince's eyes flick from the puddles to the smug face of the Admiral. Zhao bows, but not as low as is warranted when honouring a prince, and Zuko clenches his jaw before breathing deeply and bowing just as offensively low. Admiral Zhao does not miss the slight.

"Prince Zuko! To what do I owe the honour? Perhaps you have come to thank us for responding to your ship's distress call." Admiral Zhao grins wider, gleeful in his jabs at the Banished Prince's pride.

"While I commend your immediate response to my ship's distress signal, I regret to inform you that my Uncle acted in haste, and that your assistance is unnecessary. Nevertheless, I thank you." Prince Zuko bitterly dispenses the formalities.

"Consider it a serendipitous coincidence that you called and we answered. You see, I've recently received a message from His Majesty, detailing the specifics of a new assignment. You are relieved of duty, Prince Zuko. The pirate raids have only worsened, and your Lord Father would like something to be done about it, quickly. You're lucky we caught the mermaid for you, Prince Zuko. Perhaps if you take it back as a prize for His Majesty, your...transgressions at home and your failures at sea will be overlooked. And really, calling you a Prince is just a polite indulgence at this point, Zuko. Capital news claims you've been stripped of your title. Happy belated birthday, boy. You're, what, five and twenty now?"

"Four. Four and twenty." Zuko is nearly blind with rage, but given the opportunity, Zhao will tear through the hull of Zuko's ship "on accident" if he is given the right incentive. So, Prince Zuko takes the insults without a word, he takes it but will not forget it. He has always been expert in taking it. Take it on the chin and save it on the shoulder.

"I hope I haven't been too bold. If you want the fish after all, it's being kept in the bathing rooms, below deck, portside." Admiral Zhao smirks and the Banished Prince roughly shoulders past him, stepping quickly down the steps to the lower deck. The layout of Zhao's ship is similar enough to his own that the Prince is able to navigate the halls quickly. Zuko notices that the hallways are quiet - Katara has stopped her screeching, yet the Prince finds the silence ominous, eerie where there had once been a cacophony of rebellion. It is when he hears a short, pained scream that Zuko breaks his brisk walk into a run.

**Sorry, I've had this chapter and the next since Sunday, but they just don't...I don't like 'em, and if I fiddle and tweak 'em anymore I think I might make things worse. So, sorry that took so long, and sorry they aren't perfect. Um, I had a job interview today, and I got the job, so between my two jobs I'll be working anywhere from about forty to sixty hours a week. So, updating will be spotty, I am sorry. Thank you all so much for putting up with me and my story, I hope you don't hate it as much as I do! Also, man, I am so sad the pools are closed now, I had all summer but I didn't feel like going swimming until ****_now_****, crazy!**


	5. Chapter 5

**Unedited, unbeta'd, etc - note for bodily harm - this chapter is short, and in past tense because it recounts what happened to Katara as Zuko was talking to Zhao, hope there's no confusion.**

Katara had been dragged from the nets to the bathing rooms, slinging obscenities at her captors all the while, but her gusto was more bluster than not. She was tired, and that was dangerous. The bathing tub the guards unceremoniously dumped the mermaid in was cramped, her fishtail hung over the side at a painfully awkward angle. Katara's situation left her feeling far too hopeless, and sitting defenseless was not something she could abide. Before the shorter of the two guards left the room, the mermaid filched the dirk hanging at his side. It was not much, but Katara figured it was at least something she could pull as a surprise and give her some advantage, should she need it. Katara knew she would need it. Such was the mermaid's thinking until she heard the voices of the crew, wondering what the Admiral wanted her for, and Katara's mind put a break on her short-term considerations over her safety, and began to wonder over her long term situation as well.

Clammy and cold, Katara's anxiety began to sink into her skin, and she gripped the handle of the dirk tighter, eyes flitting around the room as though she could find her answers in a cobwebbed corner or a smidge of dust on the floor. Her mind was a flurry of half-formed, terrified thoughts. The Admiral might think she knew more than she had told Zuko about the pirate captain, Aang, and humans were known to be...inventive in their forms of torture. As a people, they were also known to crave conquest on an unholy scale, and if they sought subjugation above the ocean, then why not below as well? Katara would _die_ before she let some power-hungry militant use her as a tool against her people. If not that, they might want the mermaid for other, sinister purposes as well; they might tear her apart, inside-out, pluck at her scales in an attempt to figure her out. It had been known to occur before, and she could not pretend her own kind had not done the same to the bipedals. Or her fate could be less violent than any of these, but in no way less horrific; she might be forced to live out her life disgraced and humiliated, in some menagerie.

Katara felt assured there could be no happy outcomes from her capture, no saving graces, and none of the possibilities were worth the risk she might ultimately pose to her family, to her friends. She was not ready to die, not yet, and did not brace herself for it; she realised only her last living resort was left to her. The mermaid's hand clenched around the dirk as she braced herself with steady breaths. Katara's fingers fluttered, a moment's hesitation, the blink of the time it took her to lower the blade to the scales that sprinkled just below her navel, and push. She held in her cries as she dragged the dirk down the medial of her fishtail, neatly gutting it. As she did so, her scales began to fade and fall lazily into the water; the more she sawed away at herself, the less she became, until she was sitting in the discarded portions of her fishtail, that had been hacked and cut away to reveal two perfectly human legs, shivering in bloody water.

Bodily shock, exhaustion, and a sudden existential crisis immediately took their toll on Katara, rushing in all at once, and exiting on the rushing exhale of a bitter, desperate wail. She could not take that noise and thrust it back into her lungs, just as she could not stitch her tail back together or slice along her rips to reopen her gills. Instead, she clutched at her scalp, pulling her hair over her face, and her new legs, of their own accord, brought themselves in as well, for her arms to wrap around. She could not hear the sounds of the ocean anymore, not as they were; it had become a foreign call, one she could no longer answer.

**Sorry, hope it was okay. I used to blog about how I loathed fic'ers who begged for reviews, but now I can see why they do. Kinda. Mostly I'm just scared you're all gonna tell I'm even worse than I think I am. So, not getting reviews is like, whoa, I am not bad enough to get called out on, righteous!**


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